When It Clears
by Verdreht
Summary: To Tony Stark, the worst part of being a hero wasn't the fighting. No, it was standing there, waiting for the smoke to clear. Now, though, he's starting to think there just might be something worse. hurt!Steve protective!Tony Tony/Steve slash
1. Chapter 1

Contrary to popular belief, the worst part of being a hero wasn't the fighting.

Sure, the fighting bit got rough sometimes – okay, a _lot_ of times – but it was pretty par for the course. Besides, Tony would never claim to be a pacifist; sometimes, it felt good to get out there and just beat some evil-doers until they scampered off whimpering with their tails between their legs.

No, the fighting wasn't the worst.

It was what came after.

See, Tony was fine when the fists and bullets and various-assorted-freeze/heat/shrink/anti-gravity/death-ray beams were flying. When he was too caught up in the chaos to feel anything but adrenaline. When his mind was too busy charging through strategies and plans so fast an average man would probably have a breakdown.

But then the chaos would end, and the smoke would clear, and the frenzy would ebb to make room for all the other stuff. Other stuff like regret: maybe he could have done this better, maybe he could have done that faster, if only he'd thought of this in time. Stuff like realization: Fury would be furious – insert chuckle _here_ – when he found out they'd blown up a whole building, and were the streets always all cracked up like that, and what were the chances they could train Hulk to "smash" less cars in the line of duty?

Mostly, though, it was stuff like worry. Deep, gut-wrenching worry: was everyone okay? Where were they? Steve? Where was Steve? Was he hurt? Trapped under the rubble? Why wasn't he coming to join the others in the middle of the—

Oh, there he was.

"Well," he said once everyone had made their way to the impromptu powwow in the middle of what _used_ to be a New York City street, "that was fun."

To be fair, he was _reasonably_ sure that the Doombots had caused most of the damage. That said, Bruce looked awfully guilty as he looked around the wreckage. Tony didn't really see why he bothered; Fury and STARK Industries would just pay to have it rebuilt, and it wasn't like they'd just saved the city from Doctor Doom or anything. He figured they should be celebrating.

That, of course, would have to wait until they got out of there, which he promptly suggested they do.

"Shouldn't we try to help clean this up?" Steve said.

"Clean-up is very messy business," Tony said. "We should leave it to the professionals."

Natasha rolled her eyes. "You just don't want to do it."

Raising an eyebrow, Tony feigned surprise. "And here I thought that was obvious. Of course, if you feel the pressing need to stick around and show these silly civil servants a thing or two, more power to you. I'm going home. Steve?"

Steve's brows were knotted, and there was a certain responsible compassion in his eyes that, if it were anyone else, would've made Tony want to punch them in the face. But it was Steve, and this was how he was: responsible, compassionate, kind, and all other sorts of adjectives Tony used to think didn't belong in the dictionary on his word processor. Until he'd met Steve, he didn't think anyone really _was_ any of that.

But Steve was.

And now that he thought about it, there were a few more adjectives he could put with his boyfriend at the moment. Filthy, for one. He was covered in concrete powder and soot, stuck to the skin of his face by sweat. It clung to his suit, too, only, on closer inspection, Tony realized that wasn't what was soiling the royal blue fabric on his arm.

Well, now it simply wasn't a question. Walking up to Steve, he grabbed him by the arm that _didn't_ appear to be wounded. "We're going home," he said, and that was that.

They were gone before the smoke finished clearing.


	2. Chapter 2

Tony wasn't sure when this turned into a party.

Don't get him wrong: generally, he wasn't one to turn down a good shindig. He liked parties, and he had to admit, the company wasn't bad. Bruce, Thor, and Clint had all decided to come back to his – Natasha apparently had a date, the poor bastard – turning what Tony had planned as a solo night with a pseudo-spa treatment for Steve, Tony Stark style, happy ending optional (but preferred) into a boy's night in the man cave.

Determined to milk at least some close-and-personal time with his boyfriend, Tony decided on a movie that would no doubt result in having an armful of smooth skin and muscle in need of comfort and protection from petrifying pixels.

Cue: _Arachnophobia_.

Because as Tony had discovered after an unfortunate incident with a spider and a broken kitchen table, Tony had realized his boyfriend, the great Captain America…was afraid of spiders.

Having been present when Clint selected _Eight-Legged Freaks_ for the _film du jour_, he knew about what to expect. No panic attacks or anything – he wasn't that cruel; not to Steve, anyway – just lots of squirming and hiding his face in Tony's shoulder.

About an hour later proved Tony's hypothesis correct, as usual. The lights were out, and the movie was on. Thor sat in the armchair watching intently as Bruce and Clint exchanged a running commentary in whispers on the couch. Tony had Steve on the loveseat…or maybe Steve had Tony, because he was holding onto him for dear life. He put on a brave face, of course, but Tony knew him too well. He felt every shudder that passed through him, heard every discomfited groan as a spider crawled out from somewhere on the screen. Every so often, Steve would curl a little closer until it was hard for even Tony to tell where he stopped and his boyfriend began.

Not that he was complaining.

An hour and a half or so into the movie, though, Tony started to get an odd feeling, like something was wrong.

Steve was acting strange. He'd stopped groaning and squirming at the spiders…stopped reacting to the movie at all, really. Tony would've thought he'd fallen asleep, only he could feel the coils of tension in Steve's whole body as it pressed against him. And…was he shivering?

Tony was actually wondering if he could do something when Steve made up his mind for him. A giant spider had just lunged at one of the characters, Atherton, apparently surprising Steve enough to make him start.

Only, he didn't stop there. It would've been one thing if he'd just jumped, but no, he _sprang_ all the way out of Tony's arms and off the couch. Reflexes had Tony on his feet in time to catch Steve when his knees hit the coffee table and he nearly fell, but he couldn't manage to keep a grip on him when, for some reason or another, he wrenched himself away.

Crack.

Shatter.

Crunch.

That was the fourth coffee table Tony'd had to replace in the past two months, and Pepper would probably chew him out for his "shenanigans" when she found out about it. Frankly, though, Tony had bigger concerns.

"Steve?"

Steve didn't answer, but heavy breaths and reedy whines permeated the other sounds already filling the room.

"Jarvis, lights," Tony said, and a moment later, the lights flicked on, finally letting Tony get a good look at what had happened.

Steve was on his knees in the idle of the shattered glass from what had once been Tony's coffee table. His hands were braced on the ground in front of him, fingers splayed and shoulder blades jutting, and Tony winced at the sight of red blossoming on the carpet beneath him.

"Klutz," he said, his voice betraying mercifully little of the nerves bundled in his chest. He squatted down a couple feet away from him, just outside the perimeter of glass, but when he reached a hand for his heaving, sweat-dampened back, Steve flinched away.

Bruce, Thor, and Clint all flashed Tony nervous looks.

However, Tony, never one to lose his composure, forced a chuckle. "It's fine," he said. "I didn't like that one anyway. I actually like it better like—hey." He reached for Steve again, but this time, Steve actually lunged away from him, scrambling forward to the doorway of the room. "Steve, what's going on?"

Steve didn't answer him, though; he was too busy trying to stand up. "Trying" because he wasn't doing so great. Tony could see his knees shaking as he got vertical, and he had to hold the doorframe for support. Sweat had beaded on his brow.

Fuck.

"Okay," Tony said, his mind reeling. Processing. Working to incorporate every detail he could pick out to try to figure out what was going on. He was trying to be logical, to be formulaic; that was how he worked.

Observation: Steve was weak, shaky, disoriented. He was holding his stomach; his face was pale. He could hardly stand.

Hypothesis: Steve was sick. Some kind of fast-acting poison, maybe, based on the acute onset. Notable symptoms: fever, nausea, vertigo.

Prediction: it was going to get worse. It had set in quick, and he had no reason to think it wouldn't progress any further.

Experimentation: it would have to wait for later. He couldn't test what he couldn't touch.

Conclusion: he had to get to Steve. Get to him, calm him down, check him out, and _fix it_.

"I have this."

"You know what you're doing?" Clint looked dubious.

"I have a plan," Tony said. Hedged, really, and if he sounded distracted, it was because he was. Steve was getting worse; his eyes were darting around like he couldn't focus on one thing, and what he could manage to pick up was making him antsy. His chest was heaving, and he looked confused. "Which is odd, really. I usually feel better with a plan. Gives me that warm, fuzzy feeling; makes me feel great."

Bruce cleared his throat. "And now?"

Tony frowned, his brows furrowing. "Not so much."

Steve started to slip, and Thor started for him, but Tony held out a hand.

"Hold on," he said. "Just…hold on. I've got him. At least, I will get him. It's part of the plan, which is—no, you know what? Not the time." He shook his head and turned all his attention back to Steve.

He hadn't moved. Frankly, Tony wasn't sure he could've if he'd had the inclination, but at least he wouldn't have to chase him around the damn tower. He got the feeling this would be tricky enough without a game of hide and seek.

Tony started towards Steve again. "Come on, let's get you—"

"No."

At Steve's grit-teeth response, Tony was taken aback. Steve was clinging to the doorway like he was afraid he'd fall, but he was holding out a hand, as if to keep them at bay. Like he was afraid of them.

There was a twinge in Tony's chest that he refused to believe was hurt. It wasn't like Steve was _really_ afraid of him; he was just a few fries short of a Happy Meal at present. Tony wouldn't hold it against him.

However, he also wouldn't let that hold _him_ back. He was going to help his boyfriend, even if he didn't think he wanted to be helped.

"Alright, I'm done," he said. "This whole 'reasoning with the delusional super-soldier' think isn't working for me."

He took another step towards Steve; Steve took another step back, still holding the door frame for support. He was nearly out in the hall.

"You're running out of doorframe, there, Steve."

"Tony…" Clint's tone was a mix of warning and sympathy. Warning, obviously, for Tony, but it was hard to tell whom the sympathy was really for. Steve was the obvious choice, given the obvious mounting illness and debilitating delirium.

But then, Tony was having to watch the man he loved shy away from him. Delirium or no, that kind of thing stung, even if Tony tried to hide it.

And hide it he did, and he was doing a pretty bang-up job of it.

"Get away," Steve said.

Tony donned a cheeky smile. "Sorry, Cap, house rules: you don't get a say until your brain isn't melting."

Another step forward.

Another step back.

Sighing, Tony ran a hand through his hair. "Listen, if you keep backing away from me, I'm just going to have to make you stay put, and then you'll probably, you know—" he gestured wildly, "—wig out, and then I'll feel guilty, but vindicated as always knowing that I'm right and you're…well, you're clearly delusional. So just make this easier on all of us and let me help you."

Steve blinked.

"Right, not firing on all cylinders. Simple, then: don't move."

Naturally, the second Tony started for Steve, he tried backing away. He lost his balance, though, tipping backwards and downwards. He was going down, and his friends could only watch as he fell.

And then,

"Son of a bitch."


	3. Chapter 3

"Son of a bitch," Tony said as the taste of copper hit his tongue. In hindsight, it probably hadn't been wise to grab Steve like he had: grabbing his shoulders had given him plenty of room to flail one of his hands straight into Tony's lip. Like a punch, only more accidental.

Didn't make it hurt much less.

Actually, that probably wasn't true. If Steve had been _trying_ to punch him, it would've given him more than a little split lip. This had been an accident; Tony had startled him, and he'd instinctively tried to protect himself. Trying to get away.

Tony held fast, though. He was the only thing keeping Steve from a sudden intimate encounter with the floor. Because that was the last thing he needed.

Not that _Steve_ seemed to realize it. No sooner had Tony grabbed him than he started trying to break loose, twisting and pulling and tossing his full weight this way and that. Had he had more of his wits about him, Tony had no doubts he would've been able to get away.

Luckily, whatever it was making Steve so sick seemed to be putting a damper on a lot of his usual strength. Besides, Tony Stark was no pushover himself. With Steve of not-so-super human strength, or maybe even a little less, and his own adrenaline coursing, he managed to keep a grip on him. After readjusting his hold to Steve's wrists to prevent anymore accidental right hooks, he started trying to maneuver Steve to a better, more manageable position.

Weak as he was, though, Steve was still putting up a hell of a fight.

Out of the corner of his eye, Tony saw Thor step towards them. "No," he said, his tone suddenly serious. "The more people coming at him, the more defensive he'll get, the harder he'll fight. I've got it."

As if to prove his point, he suddenly let Steve pull all he wanted. He was pulling off to the side, and Tony moved with him, spinning him around and using his own momentum to push him against the wall beside the doorframe. The suddenness of Tony's turnaround caught Steve by surprise, and Tony once again used that to his advantage, barring his forearm across Tony's chest to pin his arms between them. His free hand went to Steve's brow, pushing his head back against the wall and holding it there.

He was alarmed at the heat against his palm. Definitely a fever.

Even though he was clearly incapacitated, Steve kept fighting, straining against Tony. But Tony was using his whole body to pin Steve in place, and in his state, Steve had no chance of getting loose.

"Calm down," Tony said sharply, his face mere inches from Steve's. "I'm not going to hurt you, but I need you to calm down before you hurt yourself."

Steve wasn't really listening, though. When he couldn't get his arms loose, his body loose, he tried at the very least to raise his head, especially when the others came closer. His eyes darted wildly at each and every sound, and Tony had never seen those gorgeous baby blues so scared.

Not for himself, anyway.

"Steve, it's—hey, don't look at them, okay? Look at me. Steve, just look at me." As he spoke, he pushed Steve's head back to the wall and forced him to meet his eyes. And finally, after Steve's wide-eyed gaze had settled on him, he saw some sort of recognition spark. A small hint of something through the haze he was in. "That's it. That's my boy, eyes right here. Try to focus on me."

Steve's jaw set tight; sweat slicked Tony's hand against his head, but then, there it was.

"Tony." He sounded genuinely surprised. Surprised, confused…nervous. "Tony, I don't…I don't know—"

"No, no, no. No more getting worked up," he said, brushing his thumb through Steve's sweat-dampened blonde forelock. "You're alright. You're just fine."

The words had barely left his mouth when Steve's eyes widened. Tony knew the look – and the decidedly _greenish_ tint Steve's face had taken on – and immediately stepped to the side just in time to avoid getting thrown up on by one very sick, very _pitiful_-looking Steve Rogers.

"That's…" He stopped before something mean slipped out. Pepper would've been proud. And as much as it was in his nature to antagonize, he didn't believe in kicking a man while he was down. Especially when that man happened to be a certain super-soldier for whom he had a very strong affinity.

Who the hell was he kidding? He loved the guy.

"That's something for the maid to clean up in the morning." That seemed like a much nicer way to go. And at the time, he was all about the nice. And supportive. Very supportive. Emotionally _and_ physically.

No, literally, he was holding Steve up. Whatever strength he'd had left seemed to have left him, and had it not been for the arm Tony had wrapped around his chest, he would've fallen flat on his face. As it was, Tony waited until Steve had finished feeding the birds, so to speak, and then pulled his arm around his shoulder and started trying to move him away, preferably to his bedroom.

Only, Steve could barely manage to drag his feet inches across the ground, and Tony couldn't very well pick him up. The guy was, after all, six feet and two inches of solid muscle.

Reinforcements were in order.

"Thor—a little help?"

Thor had been waiting just off to the side, so it didn't take him long to come around on Steve's other side and lift the man up like he weight two pounds instead of two-hundred forty.

Tony took it as a bad sign when Steve didn't protest. In fact, he didn't say a word – not a thing, not the whole way to the bedroom. The closest he got was a soft groan when Thor laid him out on the bed.

"I'll go get the kit," Bruce said. It took Tony a second to realize what he was talking about – his brain was overloaded, trying to deal with everything that was going on – but then he nodded, and Bruce ran out of the room. The first aid kit, with the thermometer and the bandages and the cold packs and the pills and all the other stuff that they could use to _fix_ _this_. To fix Steve.

In the meantime, Tony needed to get Steve settled, and preferably out of all of these layers. Sitting down on the bed beside Steve, he slipped an arm underneath his back. "Up you go," he said.

Steve groaned, but he didn't even have it in him to help Tony get him upright. He slumped forward against Tony's shoulder as soon as he was sitting up, a strangled moan breaking from his lips as his arms curled around his belly.

"You gonna be sick again?" He just had to be sure.

Mercifully, Steve shook his head against Tony's shoulder.

"Good. Now, let's get you out of some of these clothes." Had the situation been any less dire, Tony probably would've at least smirked at that. Instead, his lips stayed set in a hard line as he hooked his fingers in the hem of Steve's black long-sleeve sweater. "Here we go. Up and over," he said as he peeled the shirt off, leaving Steve's white undershirt on underneath.

He got it off Steve's head alright, but getting it off his arms proved to be tricky. The right one went relatively easy, but as soon as he started pulling on the left one, Steve winced.

It caught Tony by surprise for only a second before it hit him. "You're shitting me." Brows knotting, Tony pulled the sweater the rest of the way off and grimaced.

Steve's whole upper arm was red. The white shirt was soaked with it, from the shoulder to the hem of the sleeve.

Steve flinched when Tony reached for it. "Hey, easy. I just need to get a look at it."

"It's nothing," Steve said, lifting his head up off Tony's shoulder enough to look him in the eyes.

Tony matched his gaze for all of about three seconds, and then, "Yeah, I don't buy it. Hold still; let's see what's behind sleeve number two."

Carefully, he peeled back the blood-crusted fabric, revealing a gash that reached all the way around the outside of Steve's bicep. The wound itself, he guessed, wasn't too bad. Bad, yes – the sucker was deep enough to expose torn muscle and long enough that Tony could barely put his hand around it end to end – but not _too_ bad. He'd seen, had, and dealt much worse.

It was what was around the wound that was really disconcerting. Blue veins, raised and gnarly, crept out from around the edges in a way that reminded Tony too much of when he was being poisoned by the palladium core of his chest piece.

He guessed it looked that way for a reason.

"And you didn't mention this because…? Just a little 'hey, fyi, that creep Doom got me in the arm, and oh, by the way, I think I might be poisoned' would've done just fine."

Steve actually looked guilty. "I didn't think—"

"That goes without saying," said Tony. Cue another disapproving look from Bruce, who was just walking back in with a big white box tucked under his arm.

"No, but I—"

This time, it wasn't Tony that interrupted him, but round two of what was left of his dinner's comeback tour. Luckily, Clint had apparently seen it coming, because a trash can appeared in Steve's lap courtesy of him just in time to avoid what could've been a very messy turn of events.

"Atta boy. Get it all out," Tony said, rubbing Steve's back and trying to ignore the way his own stomach churned uncomfortably.

He could've sighed in relief when the heaves finally stopped their abuse of his ailing boyfriend, only he was too busy trying to figure out why Steve had suddenly gone limp. Easing him back onto the pillows, Tony took one look at the closed eyes and ashen skin, and cursed.

Steve was unconscious.

Bruce, being the closest thing to a medical doctor on hand, was there in an instant, checking Steve's vitals until he looked up at Tony.

"He's okay. He's just passed out," he said.

Tony bit back any biting retorts in favor of a question. "How long before you know what's wrong with him?"

"I'll need to run some tests," Bruce said, and then he put a hand on Tony's shoulder. "Hey…he's gonna be alright."

Tony nodded, although he would be the first to admit it wasn't his most convincing performance. "Of course," he said. "He's Captain America, super soldier. Tough as nails and all that."

He talked a good game, Tony did, but inside, he was a bundle of nerves. Steve _was_ Captain America. Captain America, who didn't get sick. Captain America, who healed like lightning. Captain America, who always lived to fight another day.

Captain America, who was the only person Tony had ever felt so deeply and _completely_ connected to.

Steve was Captain America, but more importantly, Steve was the man Tony loved. He would be okay; Tony would make sure of that.

But for now, all he could do was let Bruce do his thing and wait until the smoke cleared.


	4. Chapter 4

Tony hadn't slept.

Not "he hadn't slept well" like he'd had a nightmare or something. Though, he guessed he kind of had. He had a nightmare, only it wasn't in his head and his eyes had been open the whole damn time. _This_ was a nightmare, and because of it, his head hadn't so much as touched a pillow all night.

Steve's, on the other hand, hadn't left one.

Since he'd passed out that night, Steve hadn't woken. Generally, it wouldn't have been that odd; Steve was one of the heaviest sleepers Tony had ever seen. Only, heavy sleeper or not, a guy tended to wake up when he was poked and prodded with needles regularly. Between the various blood samples they'd taken and the IV line Bruce had started to help with the dehydration and fever, they'd turned Steve into a regular pin cushion.

And he hadn't woken up. Not once.

Tony made up for it, though, with his insomnia. He'd had Clint and Jarvis help him set up a functional lab in his bedroom so he could be productive and not have to leave Steve's side. He and Bruce had both worked through the night, Bruce having taken over the lab in Tony's work shop, and they still hadn't figured it out.

They had gotten closer, though. The blood tests had helped: they'd found traces of an unknown metalloid element that Bruce was presently working to identify, along with high levels of beta-adrenergic blocking agents and potassium iodide.

At first, the last bit had seemed like an odd combination for a poison, but about an hour after they found it, Tony had figured it out. Beta Blockers slowed adrenaline and potassium iodide slowed thyroid production, which slowed metabolism. Adrenaline and metabolism: the two things ultimately responsible for Steve's super-strength and healing. This poison blocked those, and in combination with whatever the unknown element was in his bloodstream, it had left him unable to heal and too weak to fight off the toxin running rampant through his system.

There was no missing it: this poison had been tailor-made for Steve. A poison designed solely to kill Captain America.

Was it any wonder Tony couldn't sleep?

He felt better having something to do, though. Burying his head in the sand – sand here being a euphemism for work, scathing sarcasm, the bottom of a bottle, or d) all of the above – generally made him feel a little better. So, there he was, shoulders deep in figuring out a way to counter the Beta-Blockers and the potassium iodide while Bruce looked for the last piece of their poison puzzle.

Christ, now he knew things were bad: he was thinking in alliteration.

"Jarvis, brew another cup of coffee. Extra bold."

Because caffeine also made everything better.

"Sir, this is your eighth cup," Jarvis said in that voice that sometimes made Tony wonder how he'd made artificial intelligence capable of sass.

This was one of those times. "Just do it, Jarvis."

"Right away, sir."

Tony was just about to return to his work, had his hands poised on the touchpad and everything, when something stopped him.

"Is there anything I can do?"

Tony turned to see Thor standing in the doorway. There was a sad look on his face that made Tony's teeth clench. Why did he look so sad? Steve was going to be fine. There was no reason to look so god damned miserable.

"You can stop looking like someone drowned kitten, for one," Tony said, perhaps a little more sharply than he should have. Maybe all the coffee was putting him on edge. Either way, he took a deep breath and forced himself to at least try to play nice. "He'll be fine. I'm almost done on this end, as soon as I find something to stimulate his adrenal and thyroid glands to counteract the poison. I get his Energizer Bunny going again, he'll be back to his Star-Spangled self in no time."

Thor didn't even bother trying to sort through all the more technical points of what Tony had just said. Instead, he walked across the room over to Tony and put a massive hand on his shoulder. "He's not the only one I'm worried about, friend."

Part of Tony knew that Thor was just trying to be considerate, that he should be grateful. That he should accept his friend's concern and maybe even appreciate it.

But then there was the part of Tony that had spent the last seven hours standing vigil over his boyfriend as he lay sweating and groaning and grimacing, too weak and too sick to even wake up from whatever fever-dreams had him tossing like he was. The part that had poured over textbooks worth of biochemistry and medical journals until his eyeballs were ready to bleed. The part of Tony that had drunk eight cups of coffee and hadn't slept, and the part of Tony that was _petrified_ that his boyfriend might just be—

"Alright, Arm & Hammer," Tony said. "Let's get this straight: whatever this is, this whole 'I'm here for you, bro' thing you're pulling, I don't need it. The only thing I need is for Steve to get his ass up off that bed and stop letting something as pathetic as this poison lay him out. So unless you can set that up for me, _get out_."

Thor made no move to do it, though. He'd stood through Tony's venting patiently, and when he was finished, he gave Tony's shoulder a firm squeeze. "Feel better?" he said, a sort of knowing half-smile on his face. He couldn't work a microscope, and he couldn't find a cure, but he had helped in his own way, and that pleased him.

Some of the tension eased from Tony's chest. "Little bit, yeah." He was just about to offer Thor some coffee – it was as close as he was going to get to a 'thank you', and he was probably about to overdose anyway – when he was cut short yet again. However, this time it wasn't a friend checking in.

This time, it was a cry.

It sounded startled, and it startled Tony and Thor both in turn so that they both whipped around to face the bed.

It had been Steve who cried out.

"Get them off me! Get them off!"

Tony was by Steve in an instant, one knee on the bed and his hands on Steve's shoulders, holding him still as his eyes scanned for the source of Steve's distress.

"What? Steve, what are they? What's on you?" Tony said. He sounded almost as frantic as Steve had. His boyfriend's panic had put him into a bit of a frenzy of his own; he had to make it better, had to keep him safe.

Mercifully, Steve seemed to be calming from the initial start. "Spiders," he said breathlessly, his fever-bright eyes searching the room as if he expected to see them crawling out at him and was confused when they didn't. "They were—I saw—"

"Shh," Tony said, slipping into the bed beside Steve and pulling him into his arms. He could feel Steve shaking, and he held him tighter, pulling the covers up around him and pressing a kiss to the top of his head. "You have a fever. You're hallucinating."

"But I—"

"There's nothing there. You're okay." He looked at Thor and nodded his head towards the sports bottle of Powerade on the bedside table. Thor took the hint, grabbed the bottle, and handed it to Tony.

Tony pulled the cap up with his teeth and lifted Steve's head a little. "Drink," he said, tipping the bottle to Steve's lips and holding it there until Steve had drunk a good swig of the blue liquid.

Thor was waiting to take it when Tony handed it to him. "Do you need anything else?"

"We're good," Tony said. "I've got him."

Nodding, Thor gave Steve one last glance and ducked out of the room, leaving Tony alone holding his boyfriend as tremors wracked his form.

"It's freezing."

"That's the fever. Just try to go to sleep."

Steve gave a shaky nod, but Tony noticed he leaned in a little closer, hugged Tony's arm a little tighter to his chest. "Hate being cold."

Tony guessed fifty years on ice could do that to a guy. He kept that remark to himself, though. "I know," he said instead.

Steve fell silent for a moment, but then, "Tony?"

"Yeah, babe?"

"Where was I hit?"

Tony's stomach twisted. "You didn't get hit," he said gently, trying to force back the rising nausea. He'd thought the hallucinations were over; he guessed the fog still hadn't quite lifted. "You got stabbed in the arm, but it's stitched up. It's not too bad."

"Huh…weird."

"Why? Why is that weird?" Tony was getting worried again, and he didn't like getting worried. Well, more worried than what had been his _constant_ since Steve passed out. Steve's voice was reedy, like he was in pain or trying to hold back tears.

But Steve just shook his head and closed his eyes, his brows furrowing. He was hiding it, whatever _it_ was.

"_Steve_."

Steve groaned. "'s nothing, just it—" Pause. Shift. Wince. Settle. "—it feels like it hurts everywhere _but_ my arm." He forced a chuckle. "Weird, right?"

Weird wasn't the word Tony would've used. Worrying. Terrifying. Really, really, really bad. Judging by the way Steve kept stiffening and twitching, he was going to say the pain was from muscle cramps, but he couldn't be sure beyond that. Either way, it wasn't anything he could do right now. He wouldn't leave Steve alone like this, especially not while he was still awake.

So, he just held him, brushing his fingers through his hair. "Yeah," he said. "Weird. Now, no more talking. Just…just go to sleep." Because if Tony had thought watching him suffer in his sleep was bad, he'd had another thing coming once he could actually see the pain reflected in those gorgeous blue eyes.

Mercifully, Steve didn't fight him on it. Relaxing as much as his seizing muscles would allow, Steve let his head fall back on Tony's chest. He didn't close his eyes immediately, but Tony could see them fading out of focus as the seconds ticked on. It wouldn't take long.

Tony sat there in silence, holding his lover as the fog crept in again.


	5. Chapter 5

The muscle cramps, Tony discovered, were the worst.

Yeah, the nausea had been bad. Steve hadn't been able to keep anything down, not even water. They'd had to up the fluids in his drip to compensate for all he was losing, and everything they tried to give him to help, he just threw back up.

The fever was pretty bad, too. Since the first time he'd woken up, he'd been less and less lucid. Not knowing where he was, not knowing who _they_ were, thinking something was there that wasn't…He'd given Clint a black eye already: he'd tried to get up, Clint had tried to stop him, and Steve had fought back. They never quite figured out who Steve though he was. Clint had jokingly suggested it wasn't a hallucination, just Steve capitalizing on a chance to deck his teammate without losing his noble reputation.

The treatment for the fever hadn't been that great, either. Seemed Steve wasn't too keen on getting packed with bags of ice. Tony didn't blame him. He wasn't too keen on doing it, and he wasn't too keen on trying to get his boyfriend to lie still while they "froze him again." He guessed seventy years on ice was bound to give some bad memories; he just hated they had to bring them up, especially when Steve was like this.

Still, with all of that, Tony still had to give the award for cruelest symptom to the one that'd had Steve screaming incoherently for the past three hours, on and off.

It was the second morning of Steve's sickness.

Tony had been working on testing the second (and, as it had turned out, final) batch of antitoxin when he'd heard Steve moan in his sleep. The moaning had gotten louder and louder, and by the time Tony had realized he'd woken up, Steve was screaming.

He hadn't been able to get a lot of words together after that. Tony had gleaned, from the little Steve could choke out against Tony's shoulder as he held him or the pillow as _he_ held _it_ so tight Tony thought one of them was bound to break, that it felt like all of his muscles were being shredded, like all of his joints were being ground into dust. He'd said it felt like he was dying.

And then he'd asked Tony to kill him.

The muscle cramps were definitely the worst.

And now, here he sat, watching Steve sleep a mercifully medicated sleep courtesy of enough sedatives and muscle relaxers to take down a herd of elephants.

He had finished his part of the cure, and he watched with detached fascination as the liquid flowed from the bag into the veins of Steve's still arms. They were having to introduce it into his system slowly. It would reactivate the parts of his endocrine system the poison had hampered, and if they kick-started Steve's metabolism too quickly, worst case scenario…it would do its job.

Yeah, Tony hadn't understood that one either. Not until Bruce had kindly explained it.

Steve's fever was already dangerously high. The only reason his brain hadn't melted already was what little of his superhuman vitality the poison hadn't knocked out. If his metabolism started trying to burn out the poison, he would get better, and then they'd be in brain damage territory.

Tony was all for _not_ hopping that border.

So, they were introducing it slowly, letting everything work gradually while Bruce put the finishing touches on the rest of the cure. E hadn't heard the specifics on it, yet. Didn't even know what the actual poison was, though he imagined Bruce did. It just hadn't seemed important, not when Steve was literally screaming in pain. It was his job to be there for Steve, then. He trusted Bruce with the rest.

A soft groan brought him back to the present. Steve shifted in his sleep, his face twisting into a shade of a grimace. A downside to getting him back in working order: the drugs would stop working as well. Tony knew it was only a matter of time before he started waking up again. With any luck, Bruce would have the next step of the treatment ready to go before that happened.

In the meantime, Tony knew where he would be: where he had been, where he was…where he belonged.

With Steve.

Taking one of Steve's calloused hands in his, he brushed the pad of his thumb over the bruised and split knuckles. He'd gotten Clint good, but Clint's face was apparently no pushover.

"You're gonna be fine," he said. "Super soldier like you, if you can't kick this thing in the ass, good old Uncle Sam's got some 'splaining to do. Not that I think you'd get that reference. 1951…a little bit after your big freeze. Seriously, though. They made you better, stronger, faster—" a chuckle that felt a little too much like a sob broke from his scratchy throat. "_The Six Million Dollar Man_…I know you remember that." He knew, because he'd made him watch it. He'd thought it might be ironic, and he did so love irony. "And the Nazis. Think of the Nazis. The guy that kicked their Aryan asses six ways from Oktoberfest, put down by a nick on the arm and a little poison. Never mind the Holocaust, that'd be enough to keep their faces red for a good century or two."

He was aware he was rambling, and what's more, rambling to an unconscious person, but…it was strange. When Steve had been screaming, screaming for the pain to stop, for them to put a stop to it, to him…Tony had begged for silence. Now that he had it, though…

He couldn't stand it.

With him and Steve, it was never silence. It was always joking or arguing or, even when there weren't words, it was soft rumbling chuckles from deep inside a chest or little incredulous snorts. It was meaning in glances that words couldn't convey, in gestures, in touches, in a single look.

No, it was never silence.

Tony couldn't take the silence. He couldn't stand the waiting.


	6. Chapter 6

Tony would never antagonize the S.H.I.E.L.D. medics again.

Okay, maybe that was setting his goals a little high. But there were some things he wasn't going to complain about, if not ever, then at least for maybe the next, say, three months? He could do three months.

This had earned the medics three months.

See, if it wasn't for them and their obnoxious insistence that they keep a ready supply of all of their blood, this would have been a lot more difficult. As it was, the several pints they had collected from Tony's favorite super-soldier since his thaw-out had been extraordinarily helpful.

Bruce had put the last pieces together an hour ago. The poison was a derivative of organic arsenic, and once he'd figured out what it was, it had apparently been pretty straightforward from there figuring out a treatment plan.

Tony could've kissed him. That would've been weird though, and given that neither of them had shaved since all this started, probably a little scratchy. He settled for helping him set things up.

The first was an exchange transfusion. The poison worked by binding itself to tissues and destroying red blood cells, so replacing the destroyed cells and affected tissues helped dilute the effects some.

In tandem, they had him on chelation therapy, pumping in a drug – the name of it started with a D, but it had too many syllables and not enough importance for him to remember – that would give the arsenic something else to bind to until his body could figure out a way to flush it out on its own.

To be honest, Tony hadn't been so sure about it the first hour. They'd stuck him in enough places with enough needles to make a pin-cushion sympathetic to his plight, and though he hadn't woken up all the way, it was clear Steve had felt the vast majority of it.

Now, though, with all the little pinpricks neatly bandaged, his metabolism up, and his sedatives and muscle relaxers reduced to a slightly less coma-inducing level it seemed like Steve was on the mend. It would take him a couple days to a week, Bruce said, before he was back to normal.

Tony would settle on him just waking up, already. His ass was starting to go numb, sitting there in his desk chair by the bed. It was going on ten at night, so television was for shit, and he didn't really have anything to do. As it were, the sleeping man lying in the bed was the most interesting thing going on in the room.

…these truly were desperate times.

"I'm bored," Tony said aloud and to no one in particular. It wasn't like there was anyone to say it to; the others were all downstairs. Far enough away to give Tony his space, close enough that they were there if he needed.

And Pepper said he needed to make friends. Seemed to him he had all he needed.

"I think it's only fair to warn you, last time I was bored, I found a way to hack into the PA system at the PGA tournament and blast ACDC at the last hole. Blew the guy's swing. I think he hit a squirrel…And then there's the time before that, I—"

"Stop."

Tony would've jumped, only he was too busy swiveling around in his desk chair and half-falling, half-leaping out of it and over to the bed. Bracing a hand on the bed, he leaned over Steve's still form, his eyes scanning for any signs of consciousness.

"Steve? Was that you? Because it sounded like you, and if it wasn't, I might actually have to start listening to Pepper when she says I need thera—"

"Tony."

Tony felt his heart stop dead in his chest as two slivers of the most gorgeous blue he had ever seen slid open.

"Stop…talking."

Steve was awake. He was awake, and he wasn't screaming or throwing punches or anything. He was awake, and as far as Tony could tell, he was _okay_.

More or less, anyway.

"You're awfully cranky for someone that's been sleeping for three days," Tony said, unable to keep the big ass grin off his face. He had to jab; it was in his nature. But he jabbed with love. "Wake up on the wrong side of the coma?"

"Coma?" Steve's brows knotted.

"More like an extended nap. Highly extended." And a little heavier on the drama, but he wasn't going to go into that just yet. "How are you feeling?"

"Honestly?" Steve said, shifting a little. He winced as he did, but Tony was pleased to find that he managed to at least push himself up a little on the pillows. "Like I've been hit by a tank."

"Just a tank, huh?" Tony said. "And here I thought it was going to be bad." Smiling, he sat down on the side of the bed. "You're feeling better, though, right? Seriously, I mean."

"I guess," Steve said. "I'm a little fuzzy on the comparison."

"You'll be a little fuzzy on a lot of things for the next few hours," Tony said with a chuckle. "The miracle of modern drugs. You should get a little while to enjoy it before your superpowers kick back in and spoil the buzz."

Steve just rolled his eyes. "You're a bad influence."

"But I'm sexy."

"Actually…" Steve studied Tony for a moment, "you look like shit."

"Now you're just being hurtful."

"Sorry." And he actually sounded genuinely sorry.

Damn, Tony loved this man. He exasperated, worried, and confused the hell out of him sometimes, but damn did he love him.

"Don't be. The drugs also say you get a free pass for saying whatever the hell you want."

"Huh." Steve seemed to mull over that little bit of information. "So, I have drugs..." a glimmer of the mischievous streak Tony adored came through in the form of a weak but clever smile. "What's your excuse."

"Touché. You know, I think I liked you better when you were asleep."

As if on cue, Steve yawned.

"I think that means it's bed time for Cap'n," Tony said.

But Steve shook his head. "I'm not tired."

Now, Tony had never had much experience with kids, but he imagined that was kind of what a toddler that wasn't ready for a nap would sound like.

Funny, it was actually cute on Steve.

"Your lips say no," Tony said, "but your yawn says 'sleepy time'. Come on, the world will still be here when you wake up. I'd say make the most of your downtime while you can. Fury will be riding your ass before you know it. After I've had my turn, of course."

And somehow, sleepy and sick and still a little bit stoned as he was, Steve managed to look incredulous. "Really?" he said. "Sex jokes? That's—that's…really? Really, Tony?"

"I am a product of my upbringing."

Steve raised an eyebrow. "Lots of fondue?"

Tony blinked. "Yep," he said after a moment, "definitely time to sleep. You're talking nonsense again."

"Pot and kettle, Tony." Another yawn. A cough. A wince. "Pot and kettle."

"Aren't you a steaming pile of compliments today?" Tony said, and he stood.

And promptly watched as Steve, still weighed down by drugs and weak from the poison, exerted the monumental effort required for him to shift over to one side of the bed and pull back the covers. "Sleep, Tony."

Because even when he'd just woken up from a near-death experience, Steve always had his back. He was always looking out for Tony, always caring about someone other than himself.

It was times like this Tony was reminded just how _good_ a man Steve Rogers really was. And how lucky he was to have him.

"Well," he said, a small smile on his face as he stepped out of his shoes and kicked off his jeans, "if you insist." And as carefully as he could, he slid into the bed next to his boyfriend.

One could argue that it was his weight pulling the mattress down, but Tony liked to think Steve curled into him because he liked it better that way. God only knew, as Tony slipped an arm around Steve and pulled him close, that he definitely did.

See, contrary to popular belief, the worst part of being a hero wasn't the fighting.

It was when the chaos would end, and the smoke would clear, and the frenzy would ebb to make room for all the other stuff.

But sometimes, just sometimes, it was the other stuff, what came in the aftermath, that was also _best_ part of being a hero…the best part of being alive.


End file.
